Tuesday Tales: From the Word BARE

Wow! Hard to believe August is almost over. This week, my husband and I will celebrate our 50th anniversary, so I’ll be offline for a couple of weeks. In the meantime, I leave you with this week’s Tuesday Tale based on the word BARE. Here’s the latest from Forever in my Heart.

After rinsing the shampoo from her hair, Callista applied conditioner and let it sit while she washed. There was nothing rough about the nylon sponge and bath gel she used across her bare skin, and yet she was stunned by how sore and tender she was. There weren’t any visible bruises, but she hadn’t been this sore in forever. Maybe she was coming down with something other than the twenty-six ounce flu. After rinsing the conditioner out of her hair, she turned off the shower, wrapped a terrycloth turban around her head, and dried off. Opting for a loose cotton dress instead of shorts and a top, she returned to the kitchen for another cup of coffee.

She’d just doctored it the way she liked it—sweetener and cream—when her cellphone rang. Lifting it off the charging plate, she glanced at the caller ID and groaned. Brett. He was the last person she wanted to talk to, but after last night, did she dare ignore his call again?

Apparently, from the looks on the faces of those surrounding them, everyone, except her, had known he was planning to propose; after all, they’d been dating and burning up the sheets for more than a year, the longest relationship she’d had since Luke. When Brett had popped the question in front of all of their friends last night, she’d panicked, cried no, and had run away, grabbing an uber—thankfully she’d had her purse and keys on her—and had turned off her phone until she’d gotten home. By then, Brett had called half a dozen times, and he hadn’t been the only one. Becca’s name was in her missed calls’ list, too.

The phone rang again. Swallowing her guilt, she picked it up and took a deep breath.

“Hi, Brett. About last night—”

“Stop, Callista. I’m just glad you’re okay,” he said, the relief in his voice palpable. “I was afraid you might have … never mind.”

She frowned. Never mind? Seriously? What did he think she was going to do? Throw herself off a cliff or something?

Did her friends really believe she was that big a drama queen, that emotionally fragile? My God, she’d turned him down, not the other way around. Of course, they’d  been worried. They hadn’t known she’d taken an uber and that had been discourteous of her.

That’s it. Stay safe and don’t forget to check out the other Tuesday Tales